"No doubt, else your handicap would not be 16, while mine is scratch."
"Golf is not life," I answered. "But I will tax your genius a little less. Could you for a few moments look like a director of the line, or a foreman shunter, or something of that sort?"
"I could try."
"Then," I said cheerfully, "we will bluff the collector—bluff him into believing we are that which we are not. Many people go through life like that. It is quite simple. All we have to do is to stroll up the station looking as much like commercial or mechanical despots as possible; give a kindly smile of condescension to the ticket-collector, make a casual remark about the working of the coupling rods, and pass out of the station."
"Yes," said Smithers.
"Is that all you have to say?"
"Yes," said Smithers.
"I see how it is," I said, taking my golf clubs out of the rack as the train pulled up. "You have no stomach for it; the spice of adventure it contains does not appeal to you. Well, so much for modern civilisation. I will go through alone with it; pray, if you wish, detach yourself from me until we are out of the station."
I sprang out and hurried up the platform; a servant of the company was in waiting.
"Tickets, please," he said coldly—unnecessarily coldly, I thought.